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Thanks for the etymology of pickananny. I flinched to even use it because, when I was young, I saw it on postcards that might depict a string of young black children, all smiling and eating watermelon, with a caption that might say: Dem pickannies shur do loves dere watermelon!
In my ignorance of its etymology, I was afraid it might have a more noxious origin, although association with the slave trade does forever taint it.